It was filed because the city and county wanted a more expeditious hearing, Assistant District Attorney Hilary Dozer said. Instead, the trial date was pushed from March 17 to May 5, after defense attorneys asked for more time for discovery.

Some law enforcement officers most likely will testify in person, including a gang expert and Santa Barbara police Detective Gary Siegel, who wrote a very long declaration for the injunction case, Dozer said.

They will talk about the impact gangs have on local neighborhoods, but a lot of the evidence will be submitted in writing.

About half of the 30 defendants have attorneys, and the entire defense team will prepare for a full trial now, attorney Tara Haaland-Ford said.

“I don’t think you can do a case like this without cooperating,” she said.

The defense attorneys will probably have an expert, community members and several of the clients testify. Community members who live in the proposed safety zones would talk about whether gangs are a public nuisance, Haaland-Ford said.

At Monday’s case management conference, Sterne didn’t mention the amicus brief filed by the ACLU of Southern California, which questioned the legality of the proposed gang injunction. The ACLU doesn’t represent any of the defendants in this case, but the organization has experience with injunction cases in other California cities.

It’s unclear if Sterne will consider the ACLU’s arguments in this case.

Protesters came to the hearing for the first time, many of them with tape over their mouths and handmade shirts saying “student,” “teacher,” “husband” or “father."

Even though the city has been involved in the civil court case for almost three years, there has never been a public vote on the subject, and the City Council hosted only one public hearing, where the elected officials made no comments of their own.

The group plans to keep protesting on freeway overpasses and bridges every weekend until the May trial, according to SBCC student Brandon Morse, who is fundraising for more anti-injunction signs.

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